Constitutional Propaganda

A reporter for Colorado's Aspen Daily News coined an interesting
phrase in a March 14 article, forwarded by the kind folks at the Jury Rights Project (http://www.levellers.org/jrp/)

It seems a 43-year-old local ski instructor named Jerry Begly  former member of
the Army Special Forces and a Second Amendment advocate  had received a summons to
appear for jury duty at Colorado's Pitkin County Courthouse March 9.

Mr. Begly reported as ordered, but was promptly dismissed from the jury pool and
ordered to appear five days later to "show cause" why he should not be held in
contempt of court, after he was spotted passing out leaflets to other prospective jurors
in the hallway before jury selection started.

The pamphlet Mr. Begly was handing out was a widely circulated palm-sized booklet
containing quotations from the founding fathers and such past U.S. Supreme Court justices
as Oliver Wendell Holmes and Samuel Chase, on the subject of jury powers.

This "Citizens' Rulebook" also
contained "unattributed quotes, such as 'The only power the judge has over the jury
is their Ignorance!' and 'One juror can stop tyranny with a "Not guilty vote!" '
" reported Aspen Daily News Staff Writer Rick Carroll.

The ski instructor, who told the Daily News he's for "far less
government," complained his free speech rights had thus been infringed.

The follow-up story came on March 14, under the headline: "Judge drops charges in
jury leaflet case." Summarizing what had gone on to date, reporter Carroll told his
readers Mr. Begly had been "dismissed from jury duty last week for handing out
constitutional propaganda to juror candidates."

Isn't that a delightful phrase: "constitutional propaganda"? One imagines
some basement room full of clattering old mimeograph machines, where a sneering,
modern-day Joseph Goebbels  or should that be Tom Paine?  holds court,
masterminding a sinister scheme to convince the American people they're actually supposed
to be living under a form of government where the judges, bureaucrats and other
functionaries have powers sharply limited to those specifically listed, while the people
at large  including citizens called to sit on juries  have the freedom to say
or do anything they please, so long as it's not specifically banned by written
law.

Talk about a subversive notion!

As it turned out, rather than grant Mr. Begly the public forum he was so anxious to
exploit, local Judge Erin Fernandez-Ely found discretion to be the better part of valor,
ruling, "In the interest of judicial economy, the hearing is vacated and the juror
discharged from any obligation with respect to this case and this Court." Case
dismissed.

"A juror is required to follow the law as instructed by the Court," Judge
Fernandez-Ely went on to assert, having safely buffered herself from having to confront
the very citations from our founding fathers which refute that erroneous doctrine.

It was in Colorado, of course, where the now famous case of obstinate juror Laura Kriho unfolded
a few years back. After the suburban Denver jury on which she was serving had withdrawn to
the jury room, Ms. Kriho had the nerve to violate the judge's "orders,"
discussing the sentence a young woman might receive if convicted on a minor drug charge,
and also questioning the reasonableness of such drug laws.

A fellow juror snitched on Ms. Kriho.

In that 1996 case, District Court Judge Kenneth Barnhill dismissed the jury and
declared a mistrial (though Ms. Kriho had been given no chance to try to win over other
jurors to her perfectly reasonable point of view.) Laura Kriho was put on trial for
contempt of court  apparently for failing to leap to her feet during jury selection
and announce she opposed the Drug War (though it turned out no one had specifically asked
her about that.)

Denied the jury trial she's guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution, Ms. Kriho was
convicted by one of Judge Barnhill's brethren of the Gilpin County bench, but that verdict
was finally dismissed on appeal last year.

The D.C. Court of Appeals held in the 1972 Vietnam draft case U.S. vs. Dougherty that
"The pages of history shine on instances of the jury's exercise of its prerogative to
disregard uncontradicted evidence and instructions from the judge. Most often commended
are the 18th century acquittal of John Peter Zenger on charges of seditious libel [the
case that gave Americans our freedom of the press] and the 19th century acquittals in
prosecutions under the fugitive slave laws."

The problem comes when we're asked "What specific statute gives juries the right
to disobey the judge's orders and acquit just because they think the law is bad, or has
been misapplied?"

There is no such law, of course. Neither can you find a law that says you have a right
to fly a kite, or walk your dog. The problem here is the very notion that there must be a
law to allow us to do something, when in a free nation we should be taught from
childhood a different paradigm, a different "default setting"  that we
citizens are free to do anything not specifically prohibited (and that the
government is further sharply limited in the range of things they can even seek to
regulate or ban.)

No law allows the government to appeal or overturn a jury acquittal, nor for any juror
to be questioned by authorities, or charged or punished in any way for voting to acquit,
even if the judge sits there in all his solemn majesty and says: "This jury is
instructed to convict: I am giving you no choice."

It's all one big bluff. If you ever sit on a jury deciding the fate of a fellow citizen
who you believe is being railroaded for nothing but angering a bunch of smug bureaucrats
 that he or she has never really harmed anyone  try it. Acquit on all charges.
You can, you know.

For further information on the Fully-Informed Jury movement, check out the web site http://www.fija.org

~~~o~~~

Vin Suprynowicz is assistant editorial page editor of the
Las Vegas Review-Journal. His new book, Send in the Waco Killers is available at $24.95
postpaid from Mountain Media, P.O. Box 271122, Las Vegas, Nev. 89127; or by dialing
1-800-244-2224